It was a time of irritation and turbulence in Paris. The muttering of the brooding storm was visible to fine ears through the false stillness of an apparently serene atmosphere. She, who knew keen and brilliant politicians who were not French, saw the danger that was at hand for France which France did not see.
'They will throw down the glove to Prussia; and they will repent of it as long as the earth lasts,' she thought, and she was oppressed by her prescience, for war had cost her race dear; and she said to herself, 'When that liquid fire is set flowing who shall say where it will pause?'
She felt an extreme desire to converse with Sabran as she had done at home; to warn him, to persuade him, to hear his views and express to him her own; but she did not summon him, and he did not come. She did justice to the motive which kept him away, but she was not as yet prepared to go as far as to invite him to lay his scruples aside and visit her with the old frank intimacy which had brightened both their lives at the Hohenszalrasburg. It had been so different there; he had been a wanderer glad of rest, and she had had about her the defence of the Princess's presence, and the excuse of the obligations of hospitality. She reproached herself at times for hardness, for unkindness; she had not said a syllable to commend him for that abandonment of a frivolous life which was in itself so delicate and lofty a compliment to herself. He had obeyed her quite as loyally as knight ever did his lady, and she did not even say to him, 'It is well done.'
Wanda von Szalras--a daughter of brave men, and herself the bravest of women--was conscious that she was for once a coward. She was afraid of looking into her own heart.
She said to her cousin, when he paid his respects to her, 'I should like to hear a debate at the Chamber. Arrange it for me.'
He replied: 'At your service in that as in all things.'
The next day as she was about to drive out, about four o'clock, he met her at the entrance of her hotel.
'If you could come with me,' he said, 'you might hear something of interest to-day; there will be a strong discussion. Will you accept my carriage or shall I enter yours?'
What she heard when she reached the Chamber did not interest her greatly. There was a great deal of noise, of declamation, of personal vituperation, of verbose rancour; it did not seem to her to be eloquence. She had heard much more stately oratory in both the Upper and Lower Reichsrath, and much more fiery and noble eloquence at Buda Pesth. This seemed to her poor, shrill mouthing, which led to very little, and the disorder of the Assembly filled her with contempt.